Wives in bedside brawl over businessman

A bedridden Brunei businessman got little comfort from his two wives who came to fisticuffs at his hospital bedside earlier this week, news reports said on Wednesday.

Hospital authorities were forced to cut short a visit by the ailing polygamist's two wives this week after a brawl broke out between the two women and they had to be escorted out of the ward, the Borneo Bulletin said.

The fight occurred when the unidentified man's second wife, a foreigner from Ghana, unexpectedly showed up in his hospital room when he was receiving a visit from his first wife along with their grown daughters.

One of the daughters reportedly wrapped the second wife up in a hospital blanket allowing her mother to rain blows on the woman. The bedridden man was powerless do to anything other than watch, said the newspaper.

Ten hospital security guards were summoned to break the ladies up, and both wives were escorted out of the hospital and told to stay away.

A similar incident occurred some weeks ago involving a man who was in a coma in the Intensive Unit Care (ICU) ward. His first wife also attacked his visiting second wife, driving her out of the ward.

Polygamy is legal in Brunei, an Islamic sultanate, but many Brunei men take a second wife abroad to avoid a regulation that requires them to get the first wife's consent to marry again.

The new Syariah family law also provides heavy penalties for second marriages if the unauthorised second wife is eventually brought back to Brunei.